Decorated Christmas Tree Cookies

It’s not often that I do iced cookies. Generally, I don’t have the patience for them, but the one time of year I will go crazy with them is Christmas.

I love a well iced cookie, but I as I mentioned, patience for whipping up royal icing, coloring it and then waiting for each color layer to dry isn’t something I’m too wiling to do. Especially, not when I’m knee-deep in deadlines, tired from sleepless nights with an infant and everything else life demands.

But this year, with the little guy old enough to ice, I’m rotating decorated sugar cookies into our holiday baking routine. To keep iced sugar cookies kid-friendly and doable for a 7-year-old, I started with Betty Crocker’s Sugar Cookie mix and used my poured buttercream method with Betty Crocker’s Rich and Creamy frosting to cover the cookie. From there I kept the design simple by using only one color and accenting the tree with a string of lights dotted by confetti sprinkles for the colored bulbs.

And look-ie there, I’m so happy with the way these turned out. Now that the test run is done, I can’t wait for next weekend when I’ll be making these with my little guy and my niece – while their’s may not be as precise, I have no doubt they will look great and they will have so much fun making these.

Here are a few tips for working with poured buttercream (Betty Crocker’s Rich and Creamy Frosting):

Make sure the consistency is pourable and resembles thick melted chocolate.

To achieve the correct consistency use a 2:1 ratio when heating the frosting—that’s two scoops of frosting heated in a bowl with ten second bursts in the microwave, then add one scoop of unheated frosting to the bowl. Mix to combine. If it’s too thin add more unheated frosting. If it’s too thick, heat more frosting and add it to the mixture.

Make sure the pourable buttercream frosting is well mixed or it will be streaky once dried.

For best results work in small batches.

That’s it, you are good to go. Yay to kid friendly holiday baking! For more kid-friendly baking ideas check out the links below and grab some inspiration here:

2. In a bowl, heat 1/2 cup of frosting in microwave with 10-second bursts. Add 1/4 cup of unheated frosting to heated mixture and stir to combine. Make sure it is well combined or the frosting will be streaky once dried. **See notes for more tips.

3. Place one cookie on a wire rack with a bowl underneath (to catch excess and reuse), pour heated buttercream on top. Continue to pour and cover all cookies. To pipe the string of lights, follow step two, but add two additional spoons of unheated frosting to the heated mixture for a thicker consistency needed for the piping. Place piping mixture into a pastry bag fitted with a round #3 tip. Pipe a sqiggly line across the cookie and dot with confetti sprinkles. Set aside to dry completely.

Notes

Make sure the consistency is pourable and resembles thick pouring chocolate.

1 Make sure the consistency is pourable and resembles thick pouring chocolate.

2 To achieve the correct consistency use a 2:1 ratio when heating the frosting—that's two scoops of frosting heated in a bowl with ten second bursts in the microwave, then add one scoop of unheated frosting to the bowl. Mix to combine. If it's too thin add more unheated frosting. If it's two thick, heat more frosting and add it to the mixture.

3 Make sure the pourable buttercream frosting is well mixed or it will be streaky once dried.